Erica Verrillo has written seven books and published five. She doesn't know why anyone with an ounce of self-preservation would ever want to publish. But, if you insist on selling your soul to the devil, learn how to do it right: marketing, literary agents, book promotion, editing, pitching your book, how to get reviews, and ... most important of all ... everything she did wrong.
In the interests of protecting the right to free speech, she did not vote for Trump.
#NotMyPresident

Monday, October 29, 2012

The wacky world of publishing continues with this second installment of Publishers Say the Darndest Things.

There is a lesson to be learned from these rejections.

___________________

Dr. Seuss
(Theodor Seuss Geisel's first book was rejected by 27 publishers - this is why)'too different from other juveniles on the market to warrant its selling.'

The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin
(LeGuin's book went on to win both a Nebula and a Hugo award and to reshape a genre)

'The book is so endlessly complicated by details of reference and information, the interim legends become so much of a nuisance despite their relevance, that the very action of the story seems to be to become hopelessly bogged down and the book, eventually, unreadable.'

The Female Man by Joanna Russ
(winner of the Nebula award)

"We've already published our feminist novel this year, so we don't want another" … "I'm sick and tired of these kinds of women's novels that are just one long whiny complaint."

Mary Higgins Clark
(rejected 40 times)

'Your story is light, slight, and trite.'

Colette
(Colette went on to publish 50 books)

"You won't be able to sell 10 copies."

Bridge Over River Kwai by Pierre Boulle

'A very bad book.'

The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean Auel

"We are very impressed with the depth and scope of your research and the quality of your prose. Nevertheless ... we don't think we could distribute enough copies to satisfy you or ourselves."

Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach
(sold more than 7.25 million copies)

"Jonathan Livingston Seagull will never make it as a paperback."

The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells

'An endless nightmare. I do not believe it would "take"...I think the verdict would be 'Oh don't read that horrid book'.'

Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann

' ...she is a painfully dull, inept, clumsy, undisciplined, rambling and thoroughly amateurish writer whose every sentence, paragraph and scene cries for the hand of a pro. She wastes endless pages on utter trivia, writes wide-eyed romantic scenes ...hauls out every terrible show biz cliché in all the books, lets every good scene fall apart in endless talk and allows her book to ramble aimlessly ...'

The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

'I wish there were an audience for a book of this kind. But there isn't. It won't sell.'

Emily Dickinson

'(Your poems) are quite as remarkable for defects as for beauties and are generally devoid of true poetical qualities.'

Edgar Allen Poe

'Readers in this country have a decided and strong preference for works in which a single and connected story occupies the entire volume.'

Moby Dick by Herman Melville

'We regret to say that our united opinion is entirely against the book as we do not think it would be at all suitable for the Juvenile Market in (England). It is very long, rather old-fashioned...'

Jack London

'(Your book is) forbidding and depressing.'

The Torrents of Spring by Ernest Hemingway

'It would be extremely rotten taste, to say nothing of being horribly cruel, should we want to publish it.'

Rudyard Kipling

'I'm sorry, Mr. Kipling, but you just don't know how to use the English language.'

Thursday, October 25, 2012

Given their abysmal track record when it comes to predicting what readers will enjoy, we have to wonder why publishers are so short-sighted. After all, gauging the interests of readers is their business.

The answer is quite simple.

Publishers don’t like to take a chance on anything too different from what they have already published. ( See below: ‘Too radical of a departure from traditional juvenile literature.’)

As one publisher famously said, “We want the same thing … only different.”

Acceptance criteria for large publishing houses are based almost exclusively on what they have sold before. All the necessary components of calculating potential profits — cost/benefit analyses, market projections, etc. — rest entirely on previous sales, not on the inherent value of the manuscript.

Sometimes we forget that publishing is a business like any other. Businesses don’t like to take chances, and the bigger the business, the more cautious it will be. (Random House turned down the Harry Potter books because they were “too long, and nobody would read them.”)

These pointed— and completely misguided — rejections should not only encourage you on your path to publication (you are in good company!), they should steel you against the frustration of the inevitable “Thanks, but no thanks.” Imagine where we would be if L. Frank Baum (or Oscar Wilde!) had quit after being given the brush-off. They didn’t quit and neither should you.

(Just as a case in point, my trilogy was rejected repeatedly for five years before being picked up by Random House.)

But don't take my word for it; here’s what publishers had to say about the following books:____________

The
Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

'Too
radical of a departure from traditional juvenile literature.'

The
Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

'It
contains unpleasant elements.'

Look
Homeward, Angel by Thomas Wolfe

'Terrible.'

The
Blessing Way by Tony Hillerman

'get
rid of the Indian stuff.'

Little
Women by Louisa May Alcott

'Stick to teaching.'

The
Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

'The American public is not interested in China.'

Lady Chatterly's Lover by D. H. Lawrence

'for
your own sake do not publish this book.

Garfield
by Jim Davis

'Too
many animals, and cats don’t sell.'

Zane Grey (93 books, 21 films)

'You
have no business being a writer and should give up.'

Remembrance
of Things PastMarcel
Proust

'My dear fellow, I may be dead from the neck up, but rack my brains as I may I can't see why a chap should need thirty pages to describe how he turns over in bed before going to sleep.'